I Am A Team Leader. My Boss Doesn’t Like The Performance Of One Of My Subordinates And Wants Me To Fire Him. I Think He Can Improve But My Boss Is Not Convinced. What Should I Do?

It is apparent that there is a performance issue with your team member that needs to be addressed. As a first step, you should first document the performance feedback for your team member vis-a-vis role expectations. Create a developmental plan that follows SMART goals framework (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-bound) with a clear weekly review mechanism. With this document, have a discussion with your manager on how you are planning to address his/her performance challenges and agree with your manager on a timeline for the improvement plan. Through this, you are able to 1) acknowledge with your manager that there is a performance issue, 2) communicate with the individual on what those areas are, 3) have a clear documented improvement plan in place to address the issues, 4) providing a fair timeline to the individual to work on the feedback and improve. At the end of this period, in case the individual does not show improvement and a hard call on separation needs to be taken, ownership of final decision lies with you and communicated with conviction. Please work with HR and legal teams before initiating any communication to the individual.

The decision should be presented as Boss decision. The reason behind it lies in the fact that your senior has come across lot many people while training them and in the light of the fact that the Productivity and Output are milestones for a Firm's success he would be certainly more clearer and decisive. There are different parameters while considering the scope of improvement and potential aspect. For eg. has the individual given better performance in past? Ultimately the truth lies in the fact: "The Boss is always right".